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Re: Undistributable java in main

On Saturday 01 November 2003 18:41, Etienne Gagnon wrote:
> Dalibor Topic wrote:
> > GPL says:
> > Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not
> > covered by this License; they are outside its scope. ...
>
> > As running is clearly not covered under GPL, your argument doesn't work.
>
> Modification *IS* covered by the GPL.  (FYI, it's not my argument, it's
> Richard Stallman's).
>
> Now, linking *is* a form of modification.  Were it not, you could simply
> link your proprietary program with the GNU readline library.  See
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html if you have doubts about
> useability of a GPL library within proprietary code.
>
> The fact that linking is done statically *or* dynamically is irrelevant;
> the result is that you have a combined work; all parts of the work must
> be licensed under terms that allow for the part to be combined with the
> other parts.

The big question seems to come done to:

"What part of Java is library and what part is language?"

It seems to me that at least the syntax *and* java.lang *is* the language...
Thus as long as you don't use anything else then java.lang classes, you can 
use kaffe to run *any* Java byte code, independent which license...

(If agreed on the fact that GPL does not cover running software... which is 
mostly agreed on... e.g. running MS Office in Linux)

Egon


-- 
PhD Molecular Representation in Chemometrics
Laboratory of Analytical Chemistry
http://www-cac.sci.kun.nl/people/egonw.html
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